Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government is committed to reducing avoidable food waste across the supply chain and in households, to help work towards UN Sustainable Development Goal 12.3 to halve food waste by 2030.

Our recent Circular Economy Strategy for Scotland, available on the Scottish Government website at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/circular-economy-strategy-scotland/, identifies the food system as a priority sector. Actions being taken to reduce food waste include the Government working with stakeholders on effective options to implement mandatory reporting of food waste and surplus by businesses. Requiring business to report on their food waste and surplus is intended to improve understanding on where and why food waste arises and what action can be taken to prevent it.

In addition, Zero Waste Scotland is developing an intervention plan to support long-term household food waste reduction. This includes identifying, testing and refining a range of interventions to help reduce avoidable food waste in households.

We have also commissioned research through ClimateXChange on circular economy opportunities in agriculture, including reducing on-farm food loss, and will explore how these findings can inform future action.

These actions will support Scotland's efforts to reduce avoidable food waste and make progress towards the 2030 UN target.

Cross-portfolio working across directorates and policy areas is a key priority for this Government and there are existing governance structures which support this work. Specifically in relation to the national Good Food Nation Plan, we have committed to establishing mechanisms that enable working at government official as well as ministerial level. Specific accountability mechanisms will be established once the legal duty for Ministers to have regard to the national Good Food Nation Plan when exercising certain functions is in force. These mechanisms will include internal reporting requirements to record how regard was had to the national Good Food Nation Plan.

Where planning applications come forward, planning authorities have a responsibility to consider the environmental implications of all proposals on their individual merits.

In cases where a proposal is likely to have a significant environmental effect, these powers are further supplemented by the procedures set out in the Town and Country Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment) (Scotland) Regulations 2017.

We recognise that data centres are a rapidly evolving sector. In a response to Gillian MacKay MSP on Thursday 25 June, the First Minister set out that he is giving active consideration on whether the Scottish Government should provide planning guidance to balance the rapid expansion of hyperscale data centres with national energy and climate goals which are vital to our future prosperity.

The Scottish Government has not undertaken a national assessment of the remit the member has specifically outlined on data centres. However, we are currently engaging with industry and partner agencies to better understand the cumulative impacts of data centre developments on the environment.

The Scottish Government has not undertaken a national assessment of the remit the member has specifically outlined on data centres. However, we are currently engaging with industry and partner agencies to better understand the cumulative impacts of data centre developments on the environment.

When new planning applications come forward, Scotland’s National Planning Framework 4 (NPF4) ensures the potential impacts of proposals, including cumulative impacts, are important considerations in the decision-making process. NPF4 policy 5 (soils) sets out policy protections for peatland and carbon rich soils, including prime agricultural land.

Food insecurity is driven by insufficient and insecure household income and no one should have to compromise on food or other essentials. Helping people with the cost of living is a top priority of this government and we’re investing around £3.5 billion in 2026-27 to support this, including reducing the costs of travel and helping people find and stay in work. This offers the most comprehensive cost of living support package in the UK while strengthening our public services.

Advice services are critical to Scotland’s communities, maximising incomes and helping to reduce poverty, which is why in 2026-27 we have allocated more than £18 million for the provision of free income maximisation support, welfare and debt advice.

While the Scottish Government has not undertaken an assessment of food bank use in Scotland, an evaluation of our Five Family Payments, published 4 Sept 2025, shows that The Scottish Child Payment and Best Start Foods have helped reduce food insecurity.

We set out our ambition for a Scotland without the need for food banks in the “Cash-First: Towards ending the need for food banks in Scotland” Plan. This Plan outlined nine actions to be delivered over the period 2023–2026 to improve responses to financial crisis, with a focus on increasing access to cash support so that fewer people need to rely on emergency food provision. This included a new Cash-First Programme (the Programme) to improve urgent access to cash in a crisis.

We invested over £1.5 million in the Programme, which concluded on 31 March 2026, to provide funding and practical assistance to eight area-based Partnerships to improve urgent access to cash in a crisis alongside wider support.

An interim evaluation of the Programme, was published July 2025. The final evaluation will be published later this summer and while there are no plans at present to extend the Programme, the learning will allow us to better understand the needs and priorities of households and communities to strengthen rights-based action on food insecurity across Scotland at both local and national level.

The Scottish Government has no immediate plans to reform inheritance law in Scotland. The most recent consultations on testate and intestate succession took place in 2015 and 2019. The analysis of the consultation findings concluded that there was no clear consensus on substantive reforms to the law. Research into aspects of succession has also been commissioned and we await the findings. The Scottish Law Commission is considering reforms to executry law as part of their current programme of law reform.

The Scottish Government previously considered this issue through the work of the Land Reform Review Group, an independent group established by the Scottish Government to review land reform in Scotland. Section 6 of the Group's 2014 Report to Ministers considers previous recommendations by the Scottish Law Commission to remove the distinction between heritable and moveable property in succession law. The Group concluded that they were unlikely to have a significant influence on Scotland's concentrated pattern of land ownership.

The Scottish Government subsequently consulted on the Scottish Law Commission recommendations on succession law, including proposals relating to the distinction between heritable and moveable property. Concerns were expressed by a number of respondents about issues that might be encountered by land based businesses, such as farms. These issues could have an impact on their viability and, ultimately, on the rural economy. The Scottish Government decided not to proceed with those recommendations.